Thirty-nine feet long and six and a half feet in circumference. A monster.
The construct turned its head toward me. Metal slid aside, opening a huge maw lined with rows and rows of serrated metal teeth.
The tendrils of my magic touched Rahul’s mind. He didn’t feel it. I fed a little more power into it.
“It had several operating modes and could alter its shape.” Cheryl pressed a key. The construct re-formed itself. The body coiled under the head and released eight long, segmented, metal spider legs. A nightmare.
“Does it have self-replicating capabilities?”
Cheryl put her hand flat on the desk.
If it was a signal, Rahul missed it. He was staring at me, fascinated.
“Ms. Castellano?” I prompted.
“It has regenerative capabilities,” she said. “It can repair itself.”
“Can it build axillary extensions? For example, is it able to add tentacles to itself?”
Cheryl leaned back. “What you’re suggesting is called Saito’s Threshold, a point where a construct gains life. No animator mage has ever crossed it. It’s impossible the way attaining the speed of light is impossible.”
“Why?”
“Because we do not grant life to our creations. Only animation. Our constructs do not feel. They do not think in traditional terms. They follow a simple ‘if-then’ loop. When their environment meets a certain predetermined condition, they react to it. While it gives them an illusion of free will and rational thought, they are a step above a calculator. They do not reproduce, they do not alter their structure, and they are incapable of higher brain functions or mental magic like telepathy.”
I hadn’t mentioned telepathy. It wasn’t on the table until she placed it there.
“Can a construct be made telepathic?” I asked.
Cheryl arranged her face into the embodiment of patience. “No. As I said, constructs are incapable of independent magic implantation. We have the capability to make them self-repairing. For example, you may have seen the Crawler model in the outer room. It resembles a centipede with numerous appendages protruding from its back. Crawler XII, the latest model, carries spare arms. In the event that an appendage becomes inoperable, it can jettison it and install a replacement. But it cannot manufacture a new arm or modify its design.”
“So what do you think happened to the Kraken?”
Cheryl sighed. “Environmental hazards.”
I waited.
“When the construct is forcefully pulled apart, its magic will seek to reassemble it. However, magic has limits. The Kraken’s magic signature vanished while it was clearing a school of Razorscales. I believe that they pulled it apart and either consumed enough of it or dragged the pieces in so many different directions that the distance became too great for reassembly. We’ve used echolocation and metal detectors in an effort to find the debris field; however, the Pit is filled with metal debris.”
“I’m sure that was a nightmare,” Alessandro said. “At some point, even if you found it, trying to salvage it wouldn’t have been cost-effective.”
What was he on about? A custom-made construct, especially a prototype of that size, contained titanium alloys and PGM, platinum group metals: rhodium, iridium, palladium. The metal alone would be worth millions. They should have spent weeks trying to recover it, if only to see what went wrong.
“Indeed.” Cheryl looked back at me.
“Perhaps the two of you could enlighten me?” I asked.
“Please don’t feel bad. Alessandro—”
I really didn’t like the way she said his name.
“—and I have similar outlooks. We run corporations, we employ people, and we both recognize that the cost-benefit analysis is a factor. It’s harder for you to see the big picture, not through any fault of your own, of course, but simply because you lack the relevant experience.”
Translation: Alessandro and I are special, and you are stupid and dumb and poor. And yet, somehow, I’d managed to scrape enough brain cells together to not invest in a literal money pit.
“Thank you for your time,” I said and stood up.
Alessandro rose as well.
Rahul stepped forward. “Can I have your number?”
Cheryl pivoted to him, her face mortified. “Please, excuse him,” she said, stamping each word. “He must not be feeling well.”
Rahul raised his hand, blocking Cheryl. “I’d really like to see you again. I promise, I’m not creepy.”
Alessandro stepped between me and Rahul and gave Cheryl a dazzling smile. “We really need to be on our way. It was lovely seeing you.”
Alessandro put his hand on the small of my back and gently pushed me toward the door.
“Hey.” Rahul moved to follow.
“Not one step more,” Cheryl warned him.
We escaped into the reception area and then into the museum.
“Well, he has some explaining to do,” Alessandro murmured.
“Hold on.”
I turned left toward the most recent section of the museum, and surveyed the constructs marked with Cheryl’s name. Digger XXIII, Crawler XXI, Blossom V . . . Just as I thought.
“I’m done,” I told him. We turned and made our way to the elevators.
“Where to?” Alessandro asked when we got into Rhino.
“Home.”
It was late, I was tired, and I hadn’t eaten since this morning, when I stole a couple of Arabella’s “superhealthy vegan muffins.” She’d made them special a few days ago. My sister usually cooked only under duress, but for some reason she got obsessed with that recipe. I had tried pointing out that any muffin recipe that didn’t use dairy was vegan by default, and that the loads of chocolate chips and nuts she’d put into them didn’t make them healthy, but she stuffed a muffin into my mouth and told me to mind my own business.
“Shall we compare notes?” Alessandro asked.
“Yes. Cheryl killed Felix. I can’t prove it, I don’t know if she did it alone, and I don’t understand how the serum fits into this murder, but she did it.”
Alessandro nodded. “Agreed. You go first.”
“She said that she couldn’t remember much about the day Felix died, then gave a detailed account down to the fruit she ate for breakfast. Her workshop and Felix’s office are roughly the same distance from the Pit. She left the office twenty minutes ahead of Felix and disappeared for two and a half hours.”
“What about her alibi?”
“It’s bullshit. When Cornelius’ wife was murdered, he hired Nevada to look into it. She proved that a woman named Olivia Charles murdered her. Cornelius avenged his wife and killed Olivia in a horrible way. Gloria Neville was Olivia’s best friend. She blames us for Olivia’s death.”
Alessandro smiled, a quick, vicious baring of teeth. “A blunder.”
A little scalding spark shot through me. Kissing him was out of the question. Imagining kissing him was out of the question. I dragged my train of thought back onto the right tracks.
“Yes. If Cheryl said she had dinner with anyone but Gloria, I would verify her alibi. But I have Gloria flagged. After the conspiracy to overthrow the Texas government was exposed and the dust settled, the affected Houses went after Connor and my sister. Gloria was in that mess up to her eyeballs. We keep tabs on her and her known associates, and I know for a fact that she and Cheryl are not close friends. They may sit on some of the same charity boards, but they don’t go out for drinks. Especially on Friday night. Do you know what Gloria does on Friday nights?”
Alessandro glanced at me. A little light danced in his eyes. He seemed to be enjoying himself beyond all reason. “Tell me.”
“She hosts a bingo game for her mother and her mother’s three elderly and insanely wealthy friends. They drink cheap wine and play for pennies.”
Alessandro laughed.
“Gloria was selected to be the alibi for one reason only—she will do and say anything to hurt House Baylor. If you called her right now an
d asked her if she had dinner with Cheryl, she would tell you yes and act offended that you even questioned it. And the four old ladies will lie through their teeth to back her up.”
Alessandro grinned at me again.
“Then there is the murder scene.” I leaned back. “How did Felix get onto that cable? You can’t reach it from the roof or the walkway, unless you had a ladder or caught it with some sort of extralong hook. Then, how would you get it around Felix’s neck and then dump him over the rail? Felix was a large athletic man and he was a Prime.”
Alessandro nodded. “True.”
“But if you’re a powerful animator, you can animate the wire. She had twenty minutes in the Pit. She disabled the security cameras, which meant she planned to kill him. She lured him to the spot on the walkway and the wire reached down and snapped around his neck, jerking him straight up. His neck was broken instantly.”
“It fits,” he said.
“Your turn.”
“She is afraid,” Alessandro said.
“What makes you think that?”
“I read her file. Your cousin is disturbingly thorough in his background checks. Cheryl has had no relationships after the death of her husband. Her life is split between her children and work. If she was ever involved with anyone, she must’ve gone to extraordinary lengths to keep the relationship private. This is a woman extremely conscious of her image. A woman like that wouldn’t respond to blatant interest from someone like me. She would find it inappropriate.”
“But she did.”
He nodded. “She smiled, nodded, and agreed with everything I said, even when it was utter nonsense.”
“I was wondering about the cost-benefit silliness you threw at her.”
“It’s out of character for her to respond to me. It means her position is so vulnerable that she is scrambling for any allies. She thinks I’m pretty and stupid, and therefore easily manipulated. She appealed to my fragile ego to get me on her side.”
I squinted at him. “Your ego would survive an apocalypse.”
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment.”
“It was to me.”
A flash of the old Alessandro, here one second and gone the next, so quick I might have imagined it.
“Why did you stop on the way out?” he asked.
“A hunch. People who throw around words like legacy worry me, so I wanted to see Cheryl’s accomplishments. That room is full of giants, and I don’t mean constructs. There are no I’s on Cheryl’s constructs.”
“I don’t follow.”
“When one of the Castellanos invents something new, they mark it with a Roman numeral I. Digger I, Crawler I, Blossom I.”
His eyes narrowed. “Cheryl’s constructs all have high numbers. She hasn’t invented anything new. She just refined what came before her.”
“I think so. The Kraken would have been her first attempt at an original construct. I wonder to what lengths she went to make it.”
Alessandro pondered it. It was a disturbing thought. I would need to speak to Regina. Patricia’s wife was an upper-level Significant animator. Maybe she could tell me more.
“So, what did you do to Rahul?” Alessandro asked. “I didn’t see the wings.”
“Neither did he.” How did I know he would get around to that? “I don’t always need the wings. I can do it with my voice. Sometimes I can do it with my magic alone. Seeing the wings is a privilege, Alessandro.”
“Is it?”
I couldn’t help myself. “Even Albert hasn’t seen the wings.”
“Out of curiosity, what exactly has he seen, Catalina?”
I smiled. “None of your business.”
“I’ll just have to ask Albert myself.”
“You will leave Albert alone.”
The look he gave me was pure predator. I fought the urge to freeze. It was like crouching in the middle of the woods to take a drink from a stream, raising your head, and realizing a jaguar was staring at you from among the branches.
“You don’t have the right to be jealous.”
“I’m very aware of my rights,” he said. “I would never presume to tell you who you can love. But I will protect you, Catalina. If he intends to pressure your family, he will regret it.”
“If he pressures my family, I’ll take him apart. I don’t need your help.”
“You will get it anyway.”
Arguing with him was like pouring oil on a fire.
Oh. A half-forgotten thought popped up. “When you magic a weapon into your hands, can you tell where the original is located?”
Six months ago, he wouldn’t have given me an answer. I waited . . .
“Not the exact location or distance, but I can usually determine the general direction,” he said.
“Do you remember when you roasted the tentacles that grabbed Marat with a flamethrower? Where did it come from?”
He thought about it, raised his left hand, and pointed to the left and slightly forward.
“Is that the absolute direction or relative to the way you were positioned?”
“Relative.”
He had been facing the swamp with the shore directly in front of us. There was nothing to the left of him, except muddy water.
“It was underwater,” he said.
“Yes.”
“She torched his legs and then tossed it into the Pit.”
“Yes. The Abyss must’ve grabbed him.”
“The Abyss?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know what else to call it. Let’s say I’m Cheryl. I kill Felix and now he is dangling above the water like a delicious snack. The Abyss does exactly what it did today. It grasps his body, tries to pull it under, and partially succeeds, which accounts for the bruising on his face as well as the bite. Cheryl fights it with her wire, pulls Felix’s corpse out, but the Abyss is still holding on to his legs. Cheryl grabs a flamethrower—there might have been one there—torches the Abyss, and it lets go. Then she throws the flamethrower into the water. But why go through the trouble of saving the corpse?”
He wagged his eyebrows at me. “Would you like me to tell you?”
“Yes.”
“Corporate liability,” Alessandro said. “Without the body, Felix would be declared missing. Lander would mothball the entire project and comb the Pit looking for his son.”
And he would find the Abyss. I had a strong feeling Cheryl would avoid that at all costs.
“So here we are,” I said. “I know she did it. I can’t prove it. I don’t know if anyone helped her. I can’t take it to Linus, because I haven’t found the serum. I can’t take it to Lander either. I know exactly what he would say.”
“Kill that evil bitch,” Alessandro declared, perfectly imitating Lander’s voice.
I blinked at him. “Yes. We need more information. We need proof, so we’ll have to keep digging.”
Alessandro reached over and took my hand. His warm fingers squeezed mine.
Suddenly, I didn’t know what to do with myself.
“Promise me something.”
I had to say something back. “Depends on what it is.”
“Don’t go into the Pit without me. I think that thing is fixated on you. I don’t like it.”
“I promise.”
“What was it like?”
“Like looking into a nebula. Stars suspended in luminescent dust, each point of light an extension of a central consciousness. It was aware.”
“Could you kill its mind?”
“I wouldn’t know where to start. I don’t know if anyone would. It worries me.”
He rubbed his thumb on my hand and squeezed again. He wouldn’t say it, but I knew. It worried him too.
Alessandro delivered me to the house. I got out of the car and watched him get into his Spider and drive out. Then I made my way through security, parked Rhino in its designated spot, and got out. A drone passed above me, one of Patricia’s. I waved at it, took the canvas bag with the rings from the constru
cts out of the back, and walked past our building to a smaller structure.
Walking was rather difficult. I hadn’t realized just how much the antivenom, the fight, and the recharging took out of me. My face felt heavy, like I was wearing an iron mask. My hip and side ached. The thirty-second walk kicked my ass.
Before Connor purchased it, the squat ugly building that now served as the Tafts’ home housed a company selling mysterious “Texas Products.” It came as a bonus when we bought our current place for one dollar from Connor. We remodeled it, and now Patricia and Regina used the building as their temporary residence until all of us moved somewhere better.
I rapped my knuckles on the door.
“Come in,” Regina called.
I let myself in and tracked her down to her workshop in the back. It used to be a dark garage, but Regina had replaced the steel bay doors with glass ones, painted the walls a warm shade of white, and now it was a light and airy space. Plants grew from colorful pots in the corners. A drink fridge offered cold water and Gatorade in a dozen neon colors. Next to it, a kitchenette with a sink and counter supported a teapot and a Keurig. Rocking chairs waited here and there. If it wasn’t for the floor, painted with chalkboard paint to a solid black and streaked with chalk dust, this could be a Florida room in any upscale home.
Regina stood in the middle of the floor, tapping a piece of chalk to her lips and pondering a half-finished arcane circle by her feet. Of average height, Regina was neither slender nor curvy. Her flowing maxi dress with yellow sunflowers set off the golden tone in her brown skin. She dyed her hair bright tomato red, and it floated around her head in a cloud of happy spirals. A pair of thin glasses perched on her nose.
A feline creature padded out from behind the counter. Sleek and long, made of black steel and plastic, she moved on rubber-coated paws, bound together with magic into the shape of a house cat. Nobody would mistake her for one though. She was the size of a border collie.
The cat construct sat in front of me, blocking my way, flicked her tail, and smiled. Her mouth bristled with inch-long steel fangs.
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